Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon yesterday stood by a magazine interview in which he compared former teammate Manny Ramirez to cancer and said Boston made the right decision when it traded the slugger to the Dodgers last summer.

Papelbon was quoted in the April issue of Esquire as saying, “He was on a different train! And you saw what happened with that. We got rid of him, and we moved on without him.

“So Manny was tough for us,” Papelbon added. “It’s like cancer. That’s what he was. Cancer. He had to go.”

In the Red Sox clubhouse before playing the Cardinals in Jupiter, Fla., Papelbon backed up his assertions. “I’m not afraid to say it,” he said. “If it’s the truth and I believe it, I’ll say it.”